Be Skeptical Whenever The Political/Media Class Converges On A Single Narrative

The Trump administration has ended its weeks-long silence on the disappearance of the Saudi Arabian Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Following a briefing from Secretary of State Pompeo who has just returned from a visit to Riyadh and Ankara, the president has said that contrary to some hopeful speculation that had emerged early on after his disappearance, Khashoggi does indeed appear to have been killed at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. If it is determined that the Saudis were responsible, Trump warned that there will be “very severe” consequences. Secretary of the Treasury Steve Mnuchin has announced that he will not be attending the Future Investment Initiative summit in Riyadh next week.

I’ve been following this story with some interest, but I haven’t been writing about it until now. This is one of those rare stories that has drawn the focus of both mainstream and alternative media, the latter because it’s seen as an opportunity to criticize the west’s extremely immoral involvement in the depraved activities of a murderous theocracy, and because it’s an opportunity to attack the hypocrisy of the establishment in decrying the murder of a single man while ignoring Saudi Arabia’s far more unconscionable behavior like its war crimes in Yemen and facilitation of bloodshed in Syria. Killing one man is very, very far from the top of the list of the most horrific things Saudi Arabia has done; criticizing them for that is like criticizing Henry Kissinger for not tipping well at restaurants.

The dominant anti-establishment criticism of the mainstream coverage of this story has been that they’re only upset at the Saudi royals now because their bloodshed finally touched a member of the political/media class, who are meant to be untouchable. And hey, that could be it, who knows. It is possible that all that we are looking at is the Saudi monarchy killing and killing with impunity until it killed someone the pundits and politicians are likely to meet at a cocktail party, and that’s the sole reason for the extensive coverage this story has been receiving about a government whose crimes are normally ignored. I remain very skeptical that that is the whole truth, however.

I haven’t joined in the fray of commentary about this story because I do not trust it. We are being told that Khashoggi had an unpleasant encounter with the business end of a bone saw, but we’ve seen no evidence of it. We’ve been told that there is audio footage of this happening but only unnamed Turkish officials are cited as the source of this claim. I don’t blame alternative media outlets for jumping on an opportunity to criticize an overtly despicable part of the US-centralized empire and the political/media class’s shameless complicity therewith, but the fact that the propagandists now happen to be focusing on an enemy of truth and peace right now is not a legitimate reason to begin trusting them or their narratives.

Whenever you see the politicians and media all converge in agreement across political lines upon a single narrative with a great deal of focus and promotion, it’s time to turn up the dial on your skepticism, especially when that narrative involves foreign policy. The Middle East is a hotly disputed and strategically essential zone; one need only to read this Saudi media column threatening dire consequences should the US impose sanctions on it over Khashoggi to see this. The article reads like a crash course in the geopolitical relationship between the Middle East and the western empire, saying Saudi Arabia could triple or quadruple the price of oil in response to sanctions, pull out of its extremely lucrative petrodollar arrangement with the US, cut the US off from one of the top 20 economies in the world, form an alliance with the KSA’s heretofore rival Iran, and ending with the assertion that “if Washington imposes sanctions on Riyadh, it will stab its own economy to death, even though it thinks that it is stabbing only Riyadh!”

This crucial strategic region is a nonstop story of constantly shifting alliances as immensely powerful movers and shakers fight to put themselves in dominant positions like kids playing king of the mountain. Last year alone we saw world-shaking events like the sudden unified pivot against Qatar and the so-called “anti-corruption” purge of high level members of the Saudi royal family by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MbS), the de facto decision maker of the Saudi government who is being openly accused of direct complicity in Khashoggi’s alleged murder. As noted in a solid Off-Guardian take titled “Jamal Khashoggi: or why you don’t trust the MSM even if they say what you want to hear“, we can look a little further back to when Saddam Hussein was the “good guy” in the Middle East because he was fighting Iran. There are no stationary alliances in the region with the exception of the nuclear-armed Israel for however long it exists, so we could be looking at yet another Game of Thrones-like shift in alliance.

Saudi Arabia has been a staunch ally of the US for decades, gaining the support of the most powerful military force in the history of civilization in exchange for the petrodollar deal, a strong military/intelligence/economic asset in a key strategic region, and a completely opaque and unaccountable government that can get away with perpetrating unfathomable evils that the US and its western allies could never get away with. But that doesn’t mean that can’t change as oil and energy dominance shifts and the empire restructures its assets to the benefit of the plutocrats and their lackeys. If it does change, we can expect to see a drastic shift in the narratives the pundits and politicians advance about Saudi Arabia, very much like the shift in narratives we’re seeing now. One thing’s for certain: there’s no way the empire would turn against such a vastly useful geopolitical asset just for making some shady journalist into a jigsaw puzzle.

So stay skeptical. Just because the talking heads are telling you that Jamal Khashoggi has been brutally murdered and it’s very important that you care doesn’t mean you have to believe them. If this is a propaganda narrative to advance a new oligarchic agenda, there’s no reason to go helping them advance it. Eyes wide.

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Shane Mage/October 21, 2018

Mueller, a type whom the Saudis welcomed to “live and study” in their phallocratic paradise, shows the depths to which Saudi propaganda is reduced. Apologetics for “geopolitical genocide in Yemen. Trumpian lies about a “rogue operation” aimed at his Clown Prince. Slander against Iran labelling everyone there (the majority of Iranians as shown whenever the elections are honest) as “fundamentalists” when it is the Saudi/American/Israeli machination that so reinforces the retrogressive rule of the mullahs. etc. etc. ad absurdam. Disgraceful.

Eric Mueller/October 21, 2018

I spoke of fundamentalist Iran, referring to the regime. “Fundamentalist” characterises also the Turkish and Saudi regimes – and, I would add, the Zionist entity. Characterisation of a regime is not characterisation of its subject population.

There is no excuse for Saudi atrocities, there is absolutely no justification for the US-Israeli-Turkish-Saudi-Qatari slaughter in Syria. But neither should we whitewash other – indeed similar – regimes, nor other – similar – movements, such as the Muslim Brotherhood or the Zionists.

Ishkabibble/October 21, 2018

Well said. I completely agree, but the exact circumstances of this journalists murder would be nice to know. .. (I was fascinated by Mr. Putin’s statement that he would not let the murder of one WaPo employee affect Russia’s relationship with Saudi Arabia. Maybe MbS has already scheduled a trip to Moscow to make a new petro-ruble deal!) .. To add just a bit more, anyone who believes/says that Iran is the “world’s greatest sponsor of terrorism”, while completely, deliberately ignoring what the US of A and its allies, have done to the world from its genocidal war on Korea onward to today, is IMO either a total fool or employed by one of the branches the Deep State Elite or its MSM, or one of Iran’s mortal enemies.

Shane Mage/October 22, 2018

Just a little further observation. does anyone have an idea WHY Kashoggi went to that consulate? What could have been so important there that he deliberately risked his life? The official story that he wanted to get papers signed in order to marry his mistress–and which is unquestioned by anybody–is an obvious falsification. What difference could a *Saudi* marriage certificate make to a billionaire who could buy any paperwork he desired from any government in the world? So why does anyone pretend to believe that nonsense?

Eric Mueller/October 21, 2018

I totally agree, Ms. Johnstone, that we should be very wary of this “meeting of the minds” between the MSM and alternative streams of thought.

I lived and studied in Saudi Arabia and have some perspective on this issue and the region. The mainstream has embraced Jamal Khashuqji (spelled “Khashoggi” in journalese) and that is not surprising – he is a supporter of the fundamentalist Muslim Brotherhood or Ikhwan al-Muslimun in Arabic. That fundamentalist organization had its origins in Egypt in the late 1920s and has always exemplified Islamic fundamentalism dressed in suits and ties. They are “westernized” in form and often professionals and they know how to write so as to appeal to western audiences. They are also present in all Arab countries.

When the west sought to overthrow the Libyan state of Mu’ammar al-Qadhdhafi, the FUKUS coalition of France, the UK and the US relied on the Muslim Brotherhood in Libya – the only organized opposition that existed in that Arab country. The so-called “uprising” in Syria began among Muslim Brotherhood cells in Syria, eager to overthrow a secular state that had long kept them and other fundamentalists tightly controlled.

In Egypt, after Husni Mubarak was overthrown, the US again banked on the Muslim Brotherhood to take control of Egypt and lead the country on a pro-American course.

Historically, that is in the 1950s, 60s and 70s, the Saudis were hosts and supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood, but in recent years they have had a falling out. Sponsorship of the Brotherhood has fallen to other countries – Turkey and Qatar, for example – while Saudia has tended to back other fundamentalist groups. All the Islamic fundamentalists share a largely identical ideology and outlook.

The mainstream of the west embraced Khashuqji (“Khashoggi”) because (1) he wrote liberal critiques of medieval laws in force in Saudia and (2) on a deeper level, because he was an advocate of the Muslim Brotherhood, the folks on whom the west has come to rely for loyal subversives in their effort to divide and subjugate the Arab world to the interests of the Empire and, of course, Israel.

Like Mubarak in Egypt, the Saudis are sometimes an embarrassment to the west and the prospect of replacing that regime with Islamists who are more adept at presenting a liberal façade is attractive.

Fundamentalist Iran is Saudia’s prime rival for regional influence and hegemony. The alternative media, for its part, has long come to feel that as “the enemy of my enemy is my friend,” and accordingly it has fallen into the habit of regarding Iran as pure and unsullied while Saudia can never do anything right. Accordingly, the alternative media have, as you noted, taken the opportunity presented by the Khashuqji affair to unleash their venom on the Saudi regime, not avoiding bringing up the war in Yemen.

As regards Yemen, I think it might be noted that the Yemeni Socialist Party, the party that once ruled in South Yemen, has taken a strongly anti-Iranian, anti-Houthi stance. Nobody – not even western leftists care to listen to what the YSP has to say, but the YSP from the start denounce the sudden violation by the pro-Iranian Houthi Shi’i fundamentalist militia of the fragile cease-fire that had, at least, kept Yemenis from killing each other for some years.

After the Houthis broke the truce and re-launched the civil war in Yemen, the Saudis intervened. The manner of Saudi intervention is brutal and inhuman, obviously, but I might argue that the Houthi instigation of civil war was hardly a humanitarian strategy.

In any case, Riyadh sees the war in Yemen as an Iranian effort to surround Saudia, seizing control not only of the Strait of Hormuz (gate to the Arabian/Persian Gulf) but of the Bab al-Mandab (Red Sea) as well. It is not, in my view, unreasonable that the Saudis – for geopolitical reasons – should find that prospect alarming. In addition, to the Yemenis, more than half of whom are Sunni, a takeover of the entire country by fundamentalist Shi’ah is not desirable. Being bombed by the Saudis isn’t desirable either – a position taken by the Yemeni Socialist Party, incidentally, that has nevertheless continued to support the Saudi-backed Yemeni President Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi, for wont of any neutral alternative.

I personally don’t believe that the war in Yemen is in any way a clear case of “good vs. evil” and I would wish that the alternative media could retain a bit of perspective, not necessarily falling into line behind the Houthis and Iran, out of aversion to Saudi Arabia. Yet that seems to be the case, and as a result, the alternative folks risk finding themselves squarely aligned with the mainstream in cases such as the current “Khashoggi scandal.”

Indeed as to the murder of Khashuqji (“Khashoggi”) itself, it is likely the work of elements trying to oust the Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman from the heir-apparent position. There are plenty of royals who have been offended by the Crown Prince’s rough consolidation of power, so what Trump called “rogue elements” are not hard to find inside the ruling circles of the Kingdom.

In any case, there is a pattern that whenever the global empire seeks to carry out some major maneuver, it lays the groundwork by spreading ghastly stories of the bloody mayhem for which their latest target is guilty. Saddam was a bloody killer, then al-Qadhdhafi was sponsoring gang rape, and Asad in Syria has been similarly demonized.

Frankly, the rule of any state is a bloody business. Western liberal regimes conceal their bloody repression behind veils of “legality” and delegated power, while in the Third World the repression appears more up-close and personal on the part of the leader. But either way, it’s not difficult to find some bloody scandal to turn into a propaganda casus belli when such is desired.

Julia Hubbard/October 20, 2018

Following Khashoggi’s disappearance on the 2nd October it’s clear now Turkish Intelligence suspected murder within two hours of his last being seen. Here in the UK, for the first time on mainstream news, the hostilities in Yemen were reported during peak time viewing. So maybe, it is an attempt to rein in the unruly Saudi’s for outgrowing their boots, specifically in context to your most excellent point about getting away with unaccountable unfathomable evils the US and western cohoots couldn’t, courtesy of arms purchased with their petro dollars, or is t about Syria? Maybe both!

Stephen Sadd/October 19, 2018

Ishkabibble/October 19, 2018

Reading Caitlin’s link to the Peak Prosperity article and the link within that article to the Bloomberg article are vitally important to at least a partially understand what’s been going on between the US and the countries of the middle east since 1970, but two important pieces to complete the puzzle are (IMO deliberately) left out of the Bloomberg article. .. The first paragraph of the Bloomberg article is just one sentence: .. “Failure was not an option.” .. The third paragraph is as follows (with my CAPS for emphasis). .. “The goal: neutralize crude oil as an economic weapon and find a way to persuade a hostile kingdom to finance America’s widening deficit with its newfound petrodollar wealth. And according to (Simon’s deputy) Parsky, NIXON MADE CLEAR THERE WAS SIMPLY NO COMING BACK EMPTY-HANDED. FAILURE WOULD NOT ONLY JEOPARDIZE AMERICA’S FINANCIAL HEALTH BUT COULD ALSO GIVE THE SOVIET UNION AN OPENING TO MAKE FURTHER INROADS INTO THE ARAB WORLD.” .. How could what deputy Parsky said POSSIBLY have been true? After all, the USA had existed for almost 200 years (200 years during which the USA had obviously done very well) BEFORE Treasury Secretary William Simon stepped onto a plane that was transporting him to Saudi Arabia. How could the USA’s “financial health” POSSIBLY be “jeopardized” by coming back WITHOUT some kind of new deal with a Saudi King? “What” about the USA had changed that had put it in such peril? Back to the two things left out in the article.

The first is the fact that the PRIVATE Fed’s USD and US Treasury bonds used to be “backed” by physical gold. This “backing” meant that countries who had purchased US bonds could send those bonds back to the US Treasury and receive physical gold in return. In 1971, a mere three years before Simon and Parsky made that “make or break” trip to Saudi Arabia, Nixon ENDED the convertibility of US treasuries to gold. He was literally forced to do this because some nations were sending their US treasury bonds back to the US and demanding gold in return. Nixon instantly realized that there was literally not enough gold in US gold depositories to allow the US government to CONTINUE to borrow money through the sale of Treasury bonds to fund the US’s social programs AND, at the same time, the US government’s perpetual wars of worldwide corporate/USD hegemony. Watch the following video and notice that Nixon says that what he is doing is only “temporary”. (IMO watching this video should be a mandatory part of public school curriculum.) h………..ttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iRzr1QU6K1o .. In short, it was POLITICALLY IMPOSSIBLE (taxpayers would have revolted) for Nixon to increase US tax rates enough to pay for the US’s was “up front”, AND THE SAME HAS BEEN TRUE FOR THE LAST 47 YEARS! TRUMP WILL/CAN NOT FORCE TAXPAYERS TO PAY FOR THE MIC AND, NOW, TRUMP’s PERPETUAL WARS “UP FRONT”! However, Trump’s situation is now much worse and much more dangerous than Nixon’s was in 1971. .. Then there’s the last part of that Bloomberg article’s second paragraph: “FAILURE …….COULD ALSO GIVE THE SOVIET UNION AN OPENING TO MAKE FURTHER INROADS INTO THE ARAB WORLD.” How could Simon meeting a Saudi King possibly prevent the Soviet Union from making “further inroads into the Arab world”? A later paragraph gives a hint. .. “The basic framework was strikingly simple. The U.S. would buy oil from Saudi Arabia and PROVIDE THE KINGDOM MILITARY AID and equipment. IN RETURN, THE SAUDIS WOULD PLOW BILLIONS OF THEIR PETRODOLLAR REVENUE BACK INTO TREASURIES AND FINANCE AMERICA’S SPENDING.” .. Nixon’s little plan never came to complete fruition because of the little thing called “Watergate”. In short, Nixon resigned August, 1974 and his pardoner, Ford, became CEO of the US government, Commander In Chief of the US military forces and Decider In Chief of US “foreign policy”. Because of Tricky Dicky’s little shenanigans in Southeast Asia and elsewhere, as well as Watergate, something called the Church Committee h..ttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_Committee was formed in 1975 and in 1976 produced a rather stunning report that exposed some pretty shocking domestic and worldwide activities of the CIA and other so-called intelligence agencies over the past decades. In short, Ford also could not bring to fruition Nixon’s deal with the Saudi’s. The fruit was left for the next leader of the free world, the peanut farmer from Georgia, Jimmy Carter to bring to harvest. .. In response to the USSR’s presence in Afghanistan as well as the Iranian people’s revolution against the Shah and the resulting creation of The Islamic Republic of Iran, Jimmy issued forth his own version of the Monroe Doctrine — the middle-east-shaking “Carter Doctrine”– h..ttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carter_Doctrine the second and final piece to the puzzle — in which the Great Man declared, in part, .. “Let our position be absolutely clear: An attempt by any outside force to gain control of the Persian Gulf region will be regarded as an assault on the vital interests of the United States of America, and such an assault will be repelled by any means necessary, including military force.” .. So, NOW we can understand Trump’s behavior of late. My take on it: .. Donald Trump Admits Bush’s War On Terror Is Actually President Lyndon Johnson’s War On Poverty — “I don’t want to lose an order like that.” .. h…ttps://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/trump-promises-severe-punishment-behind-khashoggis-disappearance-1152147 .. “When considering punishments if Saudi Arabia were found culpable, Trump was hesitant to suggest sanctions. ‘It depends on the sanctions,’ he said. ‘Let’s give an example: We are ordering military equipment. Everybody in the world wanted it: Russia wanted it, China wanted it, we wanted it, we got it, and we got all of it, we got every bit of it.’ .. ‘So would you cut that off, or take…’ Stahl asked. .. ‘Well, I tell you what I don’t want to do: Boeing, Lockheed, Raytheon, all these companies, I don’t want to hurt jobs, I don’t want to lose an order like that. And you know, there are other ways of punishing, to use a word that’s a pretty harsh word, but it’s true,’ Trump replied.” .. What Trump failed to mention is that the US economy LITERALLY CAN NOT AFFORD to “lose an order like that”. George Kennan explained exactly why just a few short years before the end of the Soviet Union. (What he said is even more true today.) .. “Were the Soviet Union to sink tomorrow under the waters of the ocean, the American military-industrial establishment would have to go on, substantially unchanged, until some other adversary could be invented. Anything else would be an unacceptable shock to the American economy.” .. The very serious problem for the transnational US Elite is that USD hegemony is now, for the first time since the end of WWII, being seriously challenged by other increasingly powerful nations’ economies and their currencies and their weapons. Things are no longer going completely the Superpower US’s way. China’s economy is perhaps even now larger than that of the US. .. To sum up, we are living in the competition of all tribal competitions and the outcome of this “contest” will determine the role of the US economy in the world, as well as the ultimate fate of the Fed’s hundreds of trillions, perhaps quadrillions of printed-out-of-thin-air USD. .. The US’s imposition of all these tariffs and “sanctions” and wars are absolute proof of the transnational US Elite’s flailing desperation to do only one thing –maintain USD hegemony in order to prevent Kennan’s “unacceptable shock to the American economy”. These measures will ultimately fail and, therefore the only really important question that remains is whether the increasingly-desperate US Elite will “go gentle into that good night” and develop a peace-based economy amidst near-certain economic/political/social chaos, or will this insane Elite “false-flag” the rest of the world into a no-win nuclear shootout at the OK Corral. The US Secretary of the Interior’s recent threat to perhaps use the US navy to blockade Russian exports, and the US ambassador to NATO’s recent threat to “take out” Russian missiles on Russian soil, indicate that the shoot-out is being seriously considered.

Ishkabibble/October 20, 2018

If you want to know EXACTLY what the US Elite think about the world, read the following: h…ttps://www.foreign.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/082118_Mitchell_Testimony.pdf .. If you want to truly understand the words “irony” and “hypocrisy” and “bald-faced lies”, watch JFK’s so-called “Pax Americana” speech at American University in 1963, just a few months before is murder by the CIA in Dallas. h..ttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0fkKnfk4k40 Take careful note of what Kennedy says beginning at 9:17. Here’s a transcript of that part: === “…………Second: Let us reexamine our attitude toward the Soviet Union. It is discouraging to think that their leaders may actually believe what their propagandists write. It is discouraging to read a recent authoritative Soviet text on Military Strategy and find, on page after page, wholly baseless and incredible claims–such as the allegation that “American imperialist circles are preparing to unleash different types of wars . . . that there is a very real threat of a preventive war being unleashed by American imperialists against the Soviet Union . . . [and that] the political aims of the American imperialists are to enslave economically and politically the European and other capitalist countries . . . [and] to achieve world domination . . . by means of aggressive wars.”

Truly, as it was written long ago: “The wicked flee when no man pursueth.” Yet it is sad to read these Soviet statements–to realize the extent of the gulf between us. But it is also a warning–a warning to the American people not to fall into the same trap as the Soviets, not to see only a distorted and desperate view of the other side, not to see conflict as inevitable, accommodation as impossible, and communication as nothing more than an exchange of threats………” ==== .. Now that we have the 20/20 hindsight of a decent understanding of history, compare what the US Elite said through their mouthpiece, the Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs, to their Congressional slaves on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in August 2018, to what JFK said about Soviet “propaganda” in his speech at American University in 1963.

AriusArmenian/October 19, 2018

Good advice from Caitlin. The objectives of the US Deep State in this are confusing.

My current thought is to try to analyze it as a thread within the larger geopolitical cycle we are in: the roll-out of Cold War v2 which is in phase 2 (repression of alternative voices on the Internet) and the West trying to defeat or subdue the Russia/China alliance and the BRI.

Are the Saudis closer to undermining the Petrodollar than we think? Are they too close to Russia and China? Is the US behind the Saudi killing the journalist?

Rob/October 19, 2018

As I see it, the main reason to remain skeptical is that it is the same MSM who are now hysterical about the death of Kashoggi who also practically ignored the genocidal war in Yemen for years. I will not be surprised if the currently accepted story of how Kashoggi died turns out to be mostly true, but the reason behind the obsessive concern for his death is what makes me suspicious. There is much more going on here than the death of one man, who, by the way, was a friend and admirer of the Saudi monarchy, just not of MbS.

chucknobomb/October 19, 2018

chucknobomb/October 19, 2018

Is Assange and Wiki now something against the u.s. narrative of non TRUTH ? Do the Dems. believe in Truth, Profits, or Truth? Is Donna Brazille and Debbie WS POrk? Do dems want the Embassy Cat to be treated humanely but no truth? Gays Guns and God…. Get the ph out of the way. Time out…Have a nice day!

chucknobomb/October 19, 2018

I would think Khashoggi (RIP) was a great guy living close to Fort Meade, if I had seen him at the Bradley Manning Military trial. His pictures with RPG’s and Bin Laden are nice (was Osama working with the u.s. at the time of the photo’s. BDS Free Assange and others…

Johny Conspiranoid/October 19, 2018

The Spectator has MBS as the villain of the piece big time and the Spectator is the MI6 in-house magazine. What’s important enough for the MSM to turn against MBS? Why, a threat to the petro-dollar deal itself. Maybe MBS is getting to friendly with China and threatening to sell oil priced in yuan.

Shane Mage/October 19, 2018

this is not like Saddam, who was never claimed to be more than our “lesser evil.” This looks like a galaxy-class f..k-up, and, unlike any of the “skripal” -type operations, everything was clear from the first moment, both what the f..k-up revealed and what all the gangsters involved on both sides were covering up. Kashoggi was a point man in a velvet-glove regime change operation to reign in and discipline a rogue actor, MbS–who (clown prince or not) had the street smarts to grok what was going on and reacted in the only way a type like him could envisage. This is “Godfather” drama raided to the thousandth power. and nothing at all of it can be understood except by highlighting the “background” global climate extinction crisis which has turned the Saudis’ Black Gold from the world’s most precious asset to the world’s most dangerous active volcano. But a generation ago they were warned what was coming and by a different Kashoggi (the late Adnan, their long-term oil minister) with the immortal phrase: “The Stone Age did not end because we ran out of Stones.”

Laotzu/October 19, 2018

The Jamal Khashoggi story is one that both the Saudis and the US want to re-write but the problem for the petro-dollar partners is that Turkey holds the hard evidence. It’s an unlikely coincidence that on Friday, October 12, Turkey released American pastor Andrew Brunson after more than two years of detention for his alleged role as a CIA operative accused of being part of the failed 2016 coup in Turkey. A deal would have been struck. Only two days previously, Yasin Aktay, adviser to Turkish President Tayyip Recep Erdoğan, announced that Turkey believes Khashoggi was murdered in the Saudi consulate, adding that fifteen Saudis were allegedly involved in Khashoggi’s disappearance. Obviously, the US and the Saudis would much rather this story went away. With Turkey’s connivance they can make up a story where the Saudis are not to blame. For example, some “rogue intelligence element” might be the villains but the Turks wont publicly divulge the evidence for security reasons. Meanwhile, we can enjoy worldwide theater about the importance of human rights and freedom of the press. What will Turkey’s pay-off look like? It will most likely surface further down the track when the real story is largely forgotten. Turkey could do without conflict with a wealthy trading partner like Saudi Arabia. Its currency is a disaster and some Saudi investment would be welcome. It can also ill-afford US sanctions. It just has to give the Saudi story its imprimatur and they can all more on. The world need never know the truth.

Shipway/October 19, 2018

I found it interesting that Khashoggi knew Osama bin Laden quite well, so he was probably not just referring to the KSA last month when he described how “a state-run narrative dominates the public psyche, and while many do not believe it, a large majority of the population falls victim to this false narrative.”

If you don't remember thinking much about Russia prior to the 2016, and now you think about it a lot more, that's your first clue that you've been propagandized. It's the same country it was in 2015. The threat it poses hasn't changed, only the narrative has.

"Whenever America celebrates Martin Luther King Jr. Day we should remind ourselves that it is a known, undisputed fact that the Federal Bureau of Investigation engineered a psyop to manipulate one of the world’s greatest minds into committing suicide." #MLKDay2019 #MLKDay